[cwan]

The problem with this is the potential for massive gaming. The argument of non-startups would be why should they be penalized for having hired people before this period or are considering laying them off and would not otherwise be viable without the tax advantage?

Ideally they would make the tax incentives permanent - ie reduce payroll taxes if the goal is to increase employment, but I think the startup visa is a much more interesting alternative as it seeks to attract talent that traditionally is difficult to define but is so important to how vibrant an economy is. In theory, just the fact these people bring viable ideas that people want to fund should be sufficient irrespective of jobs they create.

[neurotech1]

There is going to always be some company to game the system somehow. Look at Microsoft & their H1-B visa dependency.

That said, I think tax-breaks for increasing number of employees is a good idea.

Also, an investor can qualify for an EB-5 visa & green card by investing a $500k to $1m in "saving" 10 jobs.

[cwan]

Forgive my ignorance, but can you explain how Microsoft games the system with H1-B's?

re: tax breaks for increasing the number of employees, here's a fairly balanced posting on the subject: http://business.theatlantic.com/2009/10/would_a_payroll_tax_... - of course on a more fundamental level, payroll taxes always has struck me as odd considering essentially it's a tax on companies for hiring folks.

For me, a permanent reduction would be a far greater incentive to hire people because at least for me, I hope that I am hiring someone for more than a year or two which is when presumably the tax breaks would expire.